


Two Guesses

by ndnickerson



Series: Devil's Bargain [2]
Category: Nancy Drew - Keene
Genre: Angst, Drama, F/M, Jealousy, Nancy Drew Files, Post-Canon, Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-29
Updated: 2009-12-29
Packaged: 2017-10-05 11:35:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/41327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ndnickerson/pseuds/ndnickerson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Late night phone calls are never a good sign.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Two fifteen in the morning. Nancy stumbled out of bed and found her cell phone in her purse, but by the time she dug it out, it had stopped ringing. She sighed, swore when she stubbed her toe on the way back to bed, and dove back under the covers.

Her phone started ringing again. She pulled back the duvet and watched it hum across her bedside table, flashing impatiently.

When she checked the ID, she felt sick, but it was two in the morning. Even though she knew she shouldn't, she flipped it open. "Hello?"

"Nan... Nancy?"

"What's wrong?"

"I... what?"

"It's two-seventeen in the morning. You don't call people at two-seventeen in the morning when there's nothing wrong." She rolled onto her side and let the phone rest on her cheek so she didn't have to hold it anymore, and snuggled back under the covers. "So what's wrong."

"Uh... um. I need... to talk to you."

"I'm hanging up."

"No! No, I do. I need to talk to you. I really need to talk to you."

"So talk." Nancy hooked her thumb under the waistband of her panties. She could picture him, slumped in a booth at a club downtown, rumpled hair, fingers tapping a damp bar mat. Half-finished drink at his elbow.

_That was before,_ she reminded herself. _Not now._

"I..." his voice dropped. "No. I need to see you."

"I am not coming to see you," she said, her voice hard. "Go sleep it off, Ned."

"Baby please," he sighed. "Please. Anywhere, I'll meet you anywhere. Doesn't have to be my place. I just need to talk to you."

"Right now?"

"Yeah," he said. "Please. Please. I'm sorry. Please."

She sighed, running her fingers through her hair. "Grandy's. Thirty minutes. Order me a coffee."

She hung up during his profuse slurred thanks and slid out of bed. She hadn't wanted to keep abreast of it, but his wedding was two weeks away, and there had been no indication of prenuptial discord. It probably looked good, she thought to herself sourly, as she shimmied into a pair of jeans. Star football player and head cheerleader. Perfect. The math won't work out but no one will care.

She had confessed to Bess and George what had happened in the alley, while Denise and John had been waiting for them to return. Just enough detail for Bess's eyes to widen, her jaw to drop, and her immediate response of "Girl, I know, I know, but if he doesn't break it off with her, if he doesn't come to you on his hands and knees and beg you to take him back, then you better not talk to him until that child is five years old."

George's suggestion involved making sure that he'd never have any other children, unless they were conceived in a lab.

Grandy's was old, but not in a quirky retro cool way. The booth's fake leather seats were cracked and held together with laminate and duct tape, the lights were too bright, and the cook smoked while he lazily flipped fried eggs. It was still open, though, and clusters of kids from UC clutched their heads and ordered strong black coffee at the low tables, willing themselves to sober up enough to remember which dorms they lived in.

Ned looked exactly the way she had pictured him, down to the shirt he was wearing, and when she saw him, she felt a curious heaviness in her chest. She dropped into the other side of the booth, and as she watched his face light up, his mouth open, she ripped open two packs of artificial sweetener and stirred them into the heavy mug of black coffee. "What is it," she asked, her voice flat, as she took the first sip.

He shook his head. "What... I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. You are perfect. And she—"

"Did you have a fight, or are you just drunk?" She put the coffee down, cupping her palms around the mug to hide the slight tremor in her fingers.

His brown eyes slowly filled with hurt. "What?"

She shook her head. "I can smell it from here. What, did you want to see if you were drunk enough to mistake me for her?"

He opened and closed his mouth a few times. He had partially shredded a napkin while he was waiting for her, and his fingers curled in, crumpling a few of the pieces in his palm. "I guess I deserved that," he said.

"Deserve?" She took another long sip of her coffee. His eyelashes were so damn long. Long fingers. "I want you to understand one thing, and then I'm leaving. Unless you tell me right here and now that you aren't going to marry her, that this has all been some huge misunderstanding, I don't want to hear from you again. I won't answer your calls. I won't be a fucking drunk dial. So. Do you have anything else to say?"

He just gazed at her, then, with the most heartbroken look she had ever seen on his face. She finished her coffee in one long last sip, knowing there was no way she'd make it back to sleep, but she almost spat it out when Ned suddenly darted forward, grabbed the collar of her shirt, and pushed it to the side. He hooked a finger under her bra strap.

"You've done nothing but jump down my throat, and, Miss Detective, if your boyfriend was in your bed tonight he wouldn't have let you come here, so, let me ask you, what are you doing wearing a red bra?" He sat back, looking pleased with himself.

Nancy just stared at him for a second. A shadow fell over the table, and the waitress glanced between the two of them, a plate of dry toast in her hands. "Sorry," Nancy apologized, seeing how she was studying them. "I'm trying to get him to sober up before I take him home. Sorry."

Ned was ripping the toast into strips when Nancy was finally able to calm down long enough to get a word out. "Not that it's any of your business, but this was just the first thing I grabbed."

He shook his head. "You're wearing red panties."

Nancy grabbed her purse and started to slide out of the booth, but Ned's leg shot out, his foot between her and freedom. She closed her eyes and counted to five, slowly. "Unless you tell me the wedding is off, I have nothing more to say to you," she ground out, and when she opened her eyes they were shining.

"I don't love her."

"Then she and I have something in common."

He propped his other foot up on her seat, pinning her hips between. "She told me when she was too far along to get an abortion. She told me because she had what she wanted. And she thought this was the best way."

"Oh, right. So she put some GHB in your beer and came along three months later with a positive pregnancy test."

"Would that make it easier for you?"

"You are so full of shit," she hissed at him. "You don't just slip and fall and accidentally end up in some other girl's vagina. I don't care if you drank three bottles of tequila, obviously you haven't learned anything, and I should probably thank you for doing me the favor of showing what a fucking apathetic bastard you were before I actually got myself into a long-term relationship with you."

"What were we before?"

"Not engaged," she told him pointedly.

He ate a piece of toast, slowly, and pulled his feet down, leaving her path unobstructed. "How long were we together?"

"What's your point?"

"You think I wasn't in it... that I didn't want to be with you?"

"When you fuck someone else that's a pretty clear clue to your priorities."

His brows drew together again, his expression pained. "Okay. I have no right to ask you to forgive me. I know that."

"At least be fucking honest with me," she said, hating herself for even saying it. "I know you probably were drunk. I know. But I have never, in all the time we were together, seen you so drunk that you didn't know what you were doing. So are you honestly going to tell me that you had no clue? That somehow you actually talked yourself into believing that Denise was me?"

"Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot," he burst out. "You're right. I wouldn't have been mad at you when you cheated on me if only you'd told me that you thought they were me."

"Exactly. I'm a hypocritical bitch. Except _I didn't fuck any of them_," she said, her voice rising, and two entire tables glanced in their direction. The waitress began to move around the counter, a severely displeased expression on her face.

"I don't care how much he needs to sober up. I need to ask you two to leave."

Ned offered to cover the bill, but dropped his wallet twice trying to find money. Nancy fished through it, offered the waitress enough to cover what they had ordered plus a two-hundred-percent tip, and stalked back out to the sidewalk, arm raised to hail a cab. Ned stumbled out after her, losing his balance when the cook shoved him out the door, and fell ungracefully on his ass. She didn't look at him.

"We dated for... six and a half years," he said, so quietly she almost didn't hear him. "That's... a fourth of my life. I know I can't make up for what I did. But I don't want to lose you. I don't want you gone from my life."

"Yeah, well," she said, watching in relief as a cab slowed for her. "You managed to fuck it up pretty well anyway."

"You said... if I wasn't marrying her. Is that what bothers you? More than the baby?"

"Ned, go home." She pulled open the door of the cab. The cook and waitress were staring at them through the diner window. Ned made absolutely no move to get to his feet. "Get up. I'll let you take this cab, just get up, go sleep it off."

"Answer me," he said stubbornly.

"Answer what," she huffed impatiently.

"The wedding or the baby."

She reached for his arms to pull him up but he flopped onto his back, on the filthy sidewalk, staring up at her. "Answer me."

"Both."

"Then why—"

"I guess because I hope you can run a paternity test and prove it isn't yours. Since, after all, it was only the one time and you didn't know what you were doing," she said, her voice dripping with sarcasm at the last. "Get the fuck up."

He did finally get to his feet and stumble in the cab. She closed the door behind him, then leaned over to tell the cabbie his address, when Ned opened the other side and started to slide out.

"Ned!"

"Not going," he said, leaning over to put his head between his knees, his voice muffled. "_Not going!_ We didn't finish talking!"

Seething, she got in the cab, pulled him back inside, and slammed his door, locking it. She grated out his address to the cabbie, who pulled swiftly away from the curb, then turned to him. "You have until we get to your apartment."

He had his head pressed against his window, and he shook it, his eyes closed. "We go up," he droned. "We can talk. Nothing's gonna happen."

"You're damn right nothing's going to happen."

He smiled. "Red panties," he said softly, under his breath.

"What?"

"Nothing," he said.

She had to help him onto the elevator. "So who was that douchebag you were with last time I saw you?"

"John." She put her hand under his bowed head so he could see the engagement ring on her finger.

"Oh?" He paled, a little.

"He's at Dad's firm. And Dad loves him. 'Thank God you broke up with that loser so I could have Jonathan marry into the family,' he told me. And you were asking about the sex? It's fantastic. He can hold out for _hours,_" she drawled.

Ned's hand tightened into a fist. "But he wasn't at your place tonight."

"Law conference."

"So those red panties were for when he called and you two had hot phone sex," Ned said.

"I'm leaving you at your door, smartass."

"Every time," he slid along the wall, a little closer to her, "every time I bring them up you get mad at me. Like I'm the one who put them on you."

"_Friends_," she said pointedly, "don't talk about the color of each other's underwear. Drunk-dialing fuckhead ex-boyfriends do."

"Tell me I'm wrong."

She blushed and didn't meet his eyes. When they reached his door, he started fumbling with the key, and Nancy started to walk away but he reached out quickly and grabbed her wrist. He tugged her in with him and she stumbled in, feeling sick, her mouth dry.

"We've never been friends," he reminded her, looming over her, her wrist still trapped in his fingers. "A friend wouldn't know what your cunt tastes like. A friend wouldn't know that your favorite position is when you're facedown on the bed while I stand and fuck you until you scream. Hours? Just hours, that's all he has? I fucked up the rest of my life and I'm trying to do what's right but when I close my eyes I see you. I see the life we were going to have."

Nancy twisted away from him with a cry, unable to listen to it anymore. "You can't do this to me," she said, tears streaking down her cheeks. "You prick. Let me go," she ordered him, crossing her arms, staring at him as he stood solidly in front of the door, blocking her path.

"You're wearing red panties," he said, gazing steadily at her.

"Ned—"

"All you have to do is show me I'm wrong. If you grabbed the first thing you found on your way out the door, like you said, they're white cotton or something, and I will let you go, and I will leave you alone," he said. "But if they're red..."

She kept her arms crossed and didn't move.

"They say you can't reach orgasm unless you trust the person you're with. Unless you care deeply about them. Do you think I can still make you come, Nan?"

He took slow steps toward her, as the color deepened in her cheeks, and she trembled slightly as he reached down and carefully unfastened her jeans, unzipped them, peeled them down her hips. His face fell.

"Black lace thong."

She gave the faintest possible shrug. "Laundry day," she said softly, her face still wet, tipped up to his as his thumb hooked over the string at the back of the thong, pulling it up until it slid between her lips, tight. Her mouth opened slightly.

"You said your dad loves him. Do you love him?" He twisted the fabric and it brushed her clit, and she gasped.

"Fuck you."

"I wish you would," he said, backing her into the couch as he kissed her.

She closed her eyes as he pushed her jacket off, her purse bouncing to the floor, her jeans sliding down her thighs. She squirmed up to sit on the back of the couch, and he stepped into the V of her open legs, his hips against hers, her jeans tangled around her ankles. He leaned down and kissed her again, drawing her shirt up above the red bra that had gotten her into all this trouble in the first place.

"We can't do this," she gasped out, as he pulled her shirt over her head.

"We _can_ do this," he corrected her, his palms over the cups of her bra. "We are doing this."

She shook her head. "No."

He searched her gaze, then let his hands drop, although he was still pressed up against her. He didn't give her personal space back. "I called you," he said slowly, "and you put on a black lace thong to meet me."

"It doesn't matter what I'm wearing. It doesn't matter if I'm not wearing any panties at all. I'm not letting you do this again," she said, shoving her hips forward to give herself space to stand, pulling her jeans back up.

"You want it."

She turned on him, eyes blazing, her shirt in one hand. "You know what? That's the difference between me and you. Wanting something doesn't mean I just reach out and take it."

His jaw clenched. "How many times did guys ask you to go to bed with them after you and I started sleeping together?"

"What the fuck does that matter?" She stood an inch away from him, staring up into his face, unflinching. "I didn't sleep with anyone else until after we broke up."

"So just because you got 'involved' with every other guy you met on cases, it's not the same, because you're better than me." His face was red.

"Fuck yes I'm better than you!" she shouted back, panting in anger. "At least I could step back. And you? You don't love her, but you're more than all right with cheating on her? So what, were you going to call me every month or two, see if you could sell me your fucking sob story and see if I bit?" She slid her shirt over her head, and then her face changed, ugly realization creeping over her expression. "You planned this. You motherfucker."

"So did you." He lashed out and grabbed her thong again, twisting it savagely before she could bat his hand away, and she collapsed against the back of his couch, panting, eyes blazing with anger. "You got out of bed and came all the way to a diner just to tell me that you weren't going to talk to me unless I broke things off with Denise."

"Yes."

"Oh, that was so hard to say over the phone."

She snatched her purse off the floor and marched for the door, but he beat her there. That thick, stumbling drunk act was good, when it was convenient, she thought, glaring at him.

"Get out of my way."

"Why did you come?" He crossed his arms. "Since you swear it wasn't to sleep with me."

"Because I thought," she began, and put as much anger and distance in her voice as she could, "that maybe you were going to tell me it was all some terrible mistake, and you were going to leave her."

He nodded at her hand. "Which shouldn't matter, if you and Douchebag are so happy."

She shook her head. "All you're doing is managing to destroy every last positive feeling I have toward you, and they're dwindling pretty fast. Let me out."

"So you come here," he continued, ignoring the last, "in the hopes that I called to tell you that I want you back, and then we could have hot makeup sex. What are you doing?"

She was fishing around in her purse for her cell. She whipped it out and flipped it open, and then Ned had his powerful arms wrapped around her, and he wrenched the phone out of her hand.

"You must really not want to talk about this, if you were going to call..." he checked the phone. "What, 911?"

"You're holding me against my will," she said, panting. Her back was against his front.

"I'm holding you against my cock," he corrected, keeping her crushed against him. His arm held her partially immobile as his other hand drifted down her body, and she struggled against him perfunctorily as his fingers slid into her panties. He plunged two fingers between her legs and curved them and she straightened, gasping, the sensation spreading quick as breath over her. "Against your will, though? At least part of you is being friendly."

She gritted her teeth, concentrating on not grinding back against him. "If you just wanted to get laid tonight, I'll call a damn escort service myself. Now let. Me go."

He slowed, then pulled his hand from between her thighs. "Why are you acting like you don't want this? In the alley—"

"Yeah, I don't remember you asking," she shot back, turning around to face him.

His face went completely blank, and he didn't speak for a moment. "You came," he whispered. "You said it felt good and you came."

"And then you walked back to her without even looking at me. Like I was your fucking slut," she screamed back, the tears in her eyes spilling over finally, and she didn't care. "You were supposed to say that I matter more than her. That I'm worth more to you than a one-night stand and a baby you never wanted."

"Is that the kind of man I am? The kind of man you wanted to marry? Someone who won't take responsibility even when I would rather have shot myself than called and told you?" He ran his hands through his hair, keeping his face hidden from her. 

"Ned..."

"You're right. And it doesn't make a fucking bit of difference. She's going to have my child. She... loves me. Her parents are buying a house for us. And when I look at her, all I want is you. I have enough hell waiting for me."

She set her mouth. "Yeah, you do. And I can't do anything about that."

He gazed at her, his brown eyes sad. "Yeah you can," he said, sliding his arms around her, resting his head on her shoulder. His lips were against her neck. "Forgive me," he whispered.

"You have no right," she said, her eyes blurring with a fresh wave of tears.

"I know I don't," he murmured. Her clit twinged when she felt his breath against her ear. "I'm not asking you to take me back. I just need you to know that no matter what, I'm going to be punished enough for what I did. If I could take it back I would. And I... I want you to be happy, I've always wanted you to be happy, but I wanted you to be happy with me more than anything. And now I've fucked that up, and I can't have this between us, I will do anything, I just can't, Nan," he said, his voice breaking.

She ran her hand over his hair. "Break the engagement."

He pulled back to look into her face. "And then we can be together?"

She paused for a second, then shook her head, slowly. "I can't forgive you," she whispered. "I had no idea it was possible to hurt this much. You made me wonder what was wrong with me, Ned. You made me wonder what made it all right for you to do this."

"It hurts more every time," he said softly, his eyes searching hers. "That's the thing that surprises you most, that even when you think it can't cut any deeper, you find out you were wrong."

"So you just did this to get back at me."

His brow creased in anger, but he let her go, and she followed him into the kitchen, feeling very fragile as he drew himself a glass of water and took a long sip. "I was drunk and flirting with her, and I remember she was taking me back to the frat. I woke up and she was on top of me. Naked. Riding me. It was dark and for a second, honest to God, I thought she was you; and then I knew who she was, and I... didn't stop. I didn't shove her off me and ask what the hell she thought she was doing. It was easy, just a minute..."

Her hands were shaking when she found a paper towel and roughly wiped her face.

"I knew it was wrong and i didn't stop. And yeah, part of me... I wanted to make you see how it was, because you would come back to me and I could fucking see it on your face. But I didn't see you and then she came to me, and that was it. What the fuck else was I going to do."

"If she wasn't a virgin, you might not be the father." Her voice was surprisingly steady.

"We're going for testing in a week," he replied.

"You're not optimistic."

He shrugged. "She... she knew you and I were together, and for the most part she kept her distance, but I think there wasn't anyone else. So yeah. Are you saying that if the tests come back negative..."

"Would you still be marrying her?"

"No. She knows that." He was studying her, and even with her eyes closed she could feel his gaze, the radiance of his warmth, and then he touched her cheek. "Is that what it would take?"

"Stop it," she whispered, her arms wrapped around her belly. "It doesn't matter anymore."

He backed her against the counter, and she could feel his arms on either side of her, pinning her in, but he wasn't crushed against her. "You can't tell me you haven't given in, in a moment of weakness, and hated yourself for it. Because I know you have."

"It doesn't matter—"

"I forgave you, over and over." He kissed her earlobe and she shivered. "You made me feel like shit. You made me feel like this, this awful devil's bargain, is what I deserve. Like I was never good enough for you."

"Are you blaming me?"

"I just felt sick after." He kissed the base of her throat and she sighed. "I thought you did it for the rush. I thought I could play the game just as well as you. I cut my own heart out."

His hips brushed against hers and she arched, shoving him away. "You can't undo it," she whispered.

He took a step back. "I would," he replied. "Sometimes it hurt so much that I wished I'd never met you. Is that how you feel right now?"

Her face fell and she choked out a sob. "Yes," she cried out. "I don't ever want to see you again. I don't want to hear your voice again, I want you so fucking far away from me..."

When she glanced up at him, his face was blank with pain again. He backed into the opposite wall and slid down until he was sitting on the floor, his hands clasped so tight that his knuckles were white.

"Okay," he said quietly.

Her sight was blurred when she went into his living room, scrabbling for her jacket and purse, but when she touched his couch her knees buckled and she collapsed.

_This is it,_ she thought. _This is it. Not when you hung up the phone, not when he walked back into the restaurant, this is it. Six fucking years of your life,_ and she was crying harder, bent double with her face against her knees. _Six years._

_He is my best friend._

He was my best friend, she thought, and she remembered what he had said, and she felt that sudden tightening between her legs again. She wanted him, one more time. He was going to be married in two weeks and it would always be over between them, because he would never be able to take it back. And she had been so mad at him, but she had put on the thong anyway.

_I want him to kiss me one more time._

She stood up and then he was in the doorway to his kitchen, just gazing at her.

"I thought you were going."

She rubbed a hand over her face, her stomach doing a slow flip, and kicked her shoes off, crossed half the distance between them in bare feet. She had to force herself to say it.

"I want you to make love to me one more time."

"You said you felt like a whore," he said, his voice flat. "What would that make me?"

"A memory," she whispered. "I want to remember you this way. Take it or leave it." She was shaking.

"And then you walk out of my life."

She nodded. "You know this can't last," she said gently.

"I know," he said, and turned the lights off.


	2. Chapter 2

When they reached his bedroom and she saw the rumpled covers, the crushed pillows, her eyes blurred, even as she twisted her hands in the hem of her shirt. When he had signed the lease on this place, they had talked about seeing each other every weekend, maybe moving in together. They had made love in practically every room. This wasn't cauterizing the wound; this was jabbing the knife in again.

His shirt hit the floor, and then he reached for hers, tugged it over her head, unfastened her bra. She shrugged it off, gooseflesh rising on her bare flesh as she walked toward the bed, with him still behind her.

"Are you in love with him?"

She wrapped her arms around her belly. "Yeah," she shrugged, still not facing him. "As much as you are with her."

"Is..."

She turned, watching the way his gaze sank down to her breasts. "I'm not pregnant," she replied. "But after what happened between us, it's hard to believe that anyone's meant for happily ever after anymore. Daddy likes him and he's good in bed." She unfastened her jeans, pushed them down her long legs. "So that's enough."

"Who's better?" He was making no move to take his pants off, and his gaze was boring into hers now, despite the fact that she was naked save a scrap of black lace.

"He's better because he never makes me feel worthless," she whispered. "He always takes care of me in bed. And he wants me."

"Who were you going to think about when you touched yourself tonight?"

"Shut up and fuck me," she replied, sitting down on his bed, slowly opening her legs for him. "Unless that's what it's going to take to get you hard."

"I want you to get down on your knees and suck me off while you finger yourself," he told her, unblinking, as he shoved his jeans down, stepping out of them. He stripped his boxers off and sat down on the bed, as she stood, and he slid his arms around her waist, urging her down. "Don't get up until you come."

"What about the vibrator," she asked, sinking to her knees.

He shook his head, leaning forward. "Cheating. And besides, this way I can pretend the taste of my cock is what's making you cream yourself."

"Pretend?" she replied archly, kissing the tip of his cock as she gently tugged at her own erect nipples. She took a firmer grip and yanked them up and down, her breasts shaking as she did a slow split at his feet.

"Fuck yes," Ned breathed, watching her arch as she bent over his cock. He slid forward until he was at the edge of the bed and opened his legs, fingers twining in her hair as she took him slowly into her mouth. "Do it, baby," he moaned, urging her head down.

She slid her tongue against his length a few times, and she could swear that he somehow sensed the very instant she curved two fingers up between her thighs, resting her thumb against her clit, her entire body singing in anticipation. She tasted that first small bit of moisture as she began to thrust her fingers into her cunt, rubbing small hard circles over her clit, and she gasped against his cock.

"Yeah, yeah," he urged her, his hips thrusting forward. She pumped the base of his cock gently with the same rhythm she was driving the fingers she had buried inside her, and she moaned, her own hips rocking instinctively against her hand. "Harder," he demanded, and she took as much of his length in her mouth as she dared, relaxing her throat, flicking her clit with her nail as she creamed herself, her inner muscles shivering as her nails edged against her sensitive flesh. She gasped and Ned kept one hand on the back of her head, his other groping at her panties. Her hips thrust again and again, grinding against her own touch, and Ned was grabbing her ass, letting out his own shivering moan as she stopped fondling one nipple long enough to gently palm his balls.

She let him go as deep as he wanted and closed her eyes, the tension of her rising orgasm unbearable. Her hips shifted, she angled her fingertips against her g-spot and then she was whimpering, her screams vibrating against his hot, thick cock as he came.

His hands groped over her as he slowly pulled his cock out of her mouth. "God, baby," he whispered, watching as she roughly fingered herself, her mouth open, hips writhing. He slid down so that he was facing her, sitting next to his bed, and lifted her until her breasts were on level with his face, as he peeled her panties down her hips. He suckled against her left nipple hard and she moaned, feeling his hand cup over hers, enraptured by the desperation of her fingering.

"My fingers are longer," he reminded her, before latching onto her other breast. "Touch your clit while I finger you," he breathed against her skin, tugging her thong down another inch before he plunged his fingers, quick and rough, between her legs, and she screamed, arching.

"God, you're wet," he murmured, taking her nipple between his teeth as he fingered her. He traced a quick, shallow rhythm, fingers curving in to find her g-spot, and she shivered, rubbing her clit in rough strokes.

"Get on the floor," she begged him. "I want you to taste me, I want you to suck my clit."

He shook his head and she stopped touching herself, panting, grinding against his fingers, but then he lifted her to perch on the edge of the bed, slid her damp thong down so she was left completely naked, and she opened her legs as wide as she could as he buried his face between them, taking her clit gently between his teeth, his fingers curved up inside her again.

"Oh my God," she moaned, shivering, and fell back on the bed, and he parted her slick inner flesh with his fingers and dragged his tongue over the sensitive folds. He plunged his tongue into her cunt and she arched, her hands lazily rising to pinch at her tight nipples, fingers still slick with her own arousal. He teased her with rough strokes of his fingers and tongue, over her clit, between her thighs, until her hips moved against him in answer, until she wrapped her legs around his shoulders. She screamed his name when she came, one hand still playing with her breast, her other hand on the back of his head, forcing him against her, the sharp points of his stubble against her clit making her shudder with the exquisite pain.

He pulled away, leaving her boneless and gasping, legs still sprawled open on the bed, and vanished into his bathroom. She followed a moment later, irrationally disappointed to find that her toothbrush was not in its usual place.

He caught her expression in the mirror. "Drawer," he shrugged, through a mouthful of toothpaste lather. He spat and rinsed his face and she could still smell herself on him, could still taste him on her tongue as she brushed her teeth.

_He kept my toothbrush._

She spat out her own mouthful of lather as he dried his hands. "You don't do that with her, do you," she said, half-pleading.

He shrugged. "Not yet," he said, and she knew that one day he would.

"You had me," she whispered. "You had all of me."

He nodded, gently stroking the back of his finger over her nipple until it hardened beneath his caress. "And I know exactly how you want to be touched," he whispered, backing her against the counter. "So sensitive. So fucking wet."

"Stop talking," she whispered, her mouth slanting up against his in a hard kiss. He boosted her up and she wrapped her legs around him, her arms around his shoulders, feeling his cock begin to stir.

"So you're just gonna fuck me until I can't get it up anymore," he gasped, when they broke apart a few minutes later.

She nodded, slowly, then leaned forward, tracing his earlobe with her tongue. "Fill me up with your cock," she moaned, feeling him stir in answer. "Fuck me hard, I want to think of you every time I sit down tomorrow, I want to think of you pounding into me when I slide my fingers up into my cunt and touch my clit. Fuck me raw, fuck me until I beg you to stop."

He was visibly shaking when she pulled back, and he crushed her hips against him, the rough hair trailing under his belly button rubbing between her open thighs as he carried her back to the bed. He tossed her onto the mattress and she rolled onto her stomach, pushing herself up onto all fours, sliding her knees apart, arching so her sensitive nipples rubbed against his rough coverlet. She closed her eyes and heard him rip open the condom, and tensed in anticipation.

His first thrust was long, rough, deep as he could go, and she gasped in delighted shock. He angled her hips and fucked her hard, harder, and she thrust back just as hard, matching his rhythm, moaning with the apex of his every thrust. He pinched her nipples, tugging them roughly, and she ground herself against his cock, her inner flesh tightening against him.

In the same instant that his index finger brushed her clit, he smacked her ass, and she shuddered. "You dirty little girl," he murmured. "You want it harder, don't you. You want me to fuck you harder."

"Yes," she sobbed out, her cheek against the covers as she desperately squeezed her nipples. "Yes."

He smacked her ass again. "Does it hurt," he growled, hips shoving forward roughly as he thrust again.

"Feels so good, feels so damn good, oh God," she whimpered. "More, please, please, oh my God."

He slid out of her and she bucked, arching. He grabbed her wrists and held her palms to the bed, as her knees slid apart. "How much do you want it?"

"I'll do anything," she groaned. "Fuck me."

He was panting and she buried her face against the covers, her cheeks growing hot. She felt exposed, cold, and she knew what the next words that came out of his mouth were going to be, and she was going to cry.

_Don't, please,_ she thought, because she didn't want to think about it, not right now.

"Beg," he ordered her. "Beg for it."

He released her wrists and she rolled over, sitting up, staring at his erection. She peeled the condom off, then stood up on her knees, slowly traced her hand down until she slid her thumb between her slick inner flesh, and then rubbed the ball of it, wet with her arousal, in firm circles over the head of his cock.

"Ravish me," she moaned. "Please, please, fill me up, fuck me until I can't remember anything other than the way your cock feels inside me. Fuck me hard," she begged, arching and moving so she could squeeze his cock between her breasts. "Until I scream."

He pumped his cock against the yield of her flesh, panting. "I don't believe you."

"I want you to come inside me, please, please, I want to feel it," she said, keeping her eyes steady on his. "I'm so wet, so hot and it's just for you, please, I'm going to come out of my skin if you don't fuck me."

He grabbed her hands and she released her breasts, freeing his cock, and then he had her bent over the footrail, and she shivered hard as he thrust into her, hearing him cry out as his cock nestled in the tight wet flesh. "Fuck," he gasped out, the frame slamming into the wall with his next thrust, his next thrust, and she started panting, whimpering in pain until he was slick with her desire and his thrusts, while still brutally hard, weren't rough anymore. He grabbed her knees, holding them apart and braced so she couldn't writhe away from him, and then one hand slid lazily up between her thighs and she sobbed out his name as he touched her clit. He answered with a rough shiver of delight as her inner flesh tightened in response.

"You like that," he growled.

"Yes, yes yes oh God please," she whimpered, crying out when he dragged his thumbnail over the sensitive tip of her clit, just as he thrust his entire length inside her. She bucked and arched against him, her hips jerking in time with his thumb as he traced a quick brutal rhythm inside her, and she pulled the sheet into hard fists, whimpering and moaning and screaming out her pleasure as she began to come.

In answer he thrust again and again, until she knew her hips were bruising from being slammed against the footrail, his caress ever more brutal against her clit. He backed off every time she tightened against him, just to surge against her again, timing his thrusts so that her orgasm kept driving higher and higher.

When he came his thumb stilled, his entire length sheathed between her trembling thighs, and she slumped to the bed in relief, her inner flesh pulsing against his cock, drawing out his own orgasm.

"Oh fuck," he whispered, and he was perfectly still. "Oh my God, tell me you're still on the pill."

"What, did you think just because we were standing up in the alley that I couldn't get pregnant that way?" She wriggled her hips and he slid out of her. "Yes, I'm on the pill. A little late, though, don't you think?"

She stood unsteadily, her pulse so hard her head was pounding, and faced him, her lips trembling.

"I'm sorry, I just..."

"I know. You didn't want another bastard." She knelt down and began gathering her clothes, her eyes filling again.

He stopped her, pulling her back up. "Stay," he whispered. "I'm sorry. I just..." he gave a mirthless chuckle. "Things are just so fucking complicated as it is."

She shook her head. "They aren't," she whispered. "And by tomorrow morning it won't have happened. That's the way it has to be."

"Then stay," he whispered.

_You do this and you damn yourself,_ she thought, closing her eyes as she dropped her clothes on the floor again.

They didn't sleep in each other's arms; any intimacy at all was too much, anything more than the rhythm of sex that they had learned with each other, through nights and summers of practice. When they were together most often she would sleep with her breasts pressed to his back, her head bowed between his shoulder blades, knees tucked up behind his. Then they would turn over and he would sling his arm across her body, down over her belly, a loose fist clasped over her belly button.

Not tonight, though. Not tonight and never again. She wondered whether Denise had slept beside him just like this and started crying again, and he didn't touch her. There was no comfort left, and she had never thought making love to him would feel so meaningless.

Making love. She closed her eyes, turning onto her side, away from him. Imagined going back to her apartment, calling Jonathan with sobs choking her voice, telling him that her ex-boyfriend had seduced her. Imagined Jonathan stalking through Ned's door and punching his lights out.

She wanted him to hurt, really hurt.

_Sometimes I wish I'd never met you._

She wouldn't be alive if not for him. He had saved her life so many times. He had been there for her through so much, and she would never trust Jonathan, never confide in him the way she had in Ned. That ability had been broken in her the moment she heard Ned speak the words.

_There would have been someone else,_ she thought. _If not him._ But so much of her, so much of her life had been shaped, however subtly, by his. She had thrilled with anticipation at his kisses, learned the ways he liked to be touched, become so attuned to the ritual of their joining that he barely had to brush her clit for her to tremble under him. For better or worse, she had learned him, and when Jonathan had figured out what made her wet, what made her come, he had been learning the ways Ned had trained her.

_You have to remember this. This is all you'll have._

She buried her face in the pillow and drew the scent of his shampoo, detergent, him, deep into her lungs, stretching under the covers before she pulled herself into a tight ball.

When she woke, skin gleaming with sweat, panting, he had his hand between her thighs, gently caressing until she was slick, arching, her hand coming down to cup over his. He pulled away to lift her leg, to slide inside her while they were still spooned up together, but she rolled onto her back instead, opening her legs, gazing up at him.

Then he pinned her under him, guiding his cock inside her, and she arched immediately, urging him deeper, wrapping her legs around his waist.

They had been like this the first time, she remembered, and pulled in a slow breath, concentrating on that instead of the tears thickening in her throat, drawing circles with the pads of her fingers over his nipples, drawing her nails over less sensitive skin. He slid in and out of her, achingly slow, each thrust deeper than the last. Her hips shook in answer, grinding against him, moving in small circles against his cock. Her mouth fell open but she kept holding his gaze, and watching what she was doing to him, watching him smile at what he was doing to her, made her inner flesh tighten in a quick spasm around him.

He leaned down and kissed her once, gently, and then began to move over her in long, deep strokes, body driving against hers hard, panting as she bucked under him. She grabbed her ankles, pulling them up toward his shoulder blades, and cried out, desperate for him, desperate for him to break the tension he was teasing inside her. The powerful strokes of his cock against her tight, wet flesh were enough to make her come, even though he hadn't so much as breathed on her clit, and she struggled against him in that momentary fit of thrumming agony before she came completely, her hips, her entire body jerking under his, desiring nothing more than to pull him closer, to draw him more deeply into her, to feel his hips thrust forward in that last driving jolt as he let himself reach satisfaction in her.

They hadn't spoken, the entire time, had barely made any noise at all. Her breath was ragged, heart beating against her ribs as they came down, his face buried in the pillow beside her head. "You," he whispered, pulling back to see her face, and traced his hand down her cheek.

She only nodded, and sighed when he finally pulled out of her.

He looked like he wanted to say something else, but then laid down beside her, his hand resting on her hip. She tucked her knees up, one arm hanging over the side of the mattress, afraid to touch him.

She knew she should leave. When he went to sleep, she'd slip out. No long goodbyes, no melting glances, just leave him behind.

His fingers brushed her belly.

She had dreamed of carrying his child, one day. She had dreamed of them together, happy, in love, and her grief at knowing that now it was impossible was incredibly strong. Maybe the tests would come out, would show that Denise had just settled on Ned as her best prospect, but she knew she wasn't that lucky. Denise would have him.

Even so, when she imagined that somehow, despite her careful adherence to her birth control regimen, if only...

_No,_ she thought. Like he had said, things were already complicated enough. Raising a child with half a father wasn't an answer.

_That was supposed to be my child,_ she thought, and curled into a tighter ball. _Our child. She stole it from me._

She didn't dream. Every time she opened her eyes the sky had lightened a little more, and she felt more and more miserable when she closed them again. She opened her eyes and he had pulled the quilt over both of them. She stretched and he nestled against her back, arm draped over her.

Finally she couldn't take it anymore. She began to gently slide away from him, but when she glanced back, the urge to touch him, to see if it was really so easy, stole over her. She nudged him onto his back and he gave a soft moan when her fingertips brushed his cock. She watched his face, but his eyes stayed closed, his cock rising under her caress.

She swung over him, straddling his waist, angling his cock. She stroked her clit a few times, making sure she was ready for him, then slowly slid her knees apart, leading him between her thighs.

His hips jerked, and Ned groaned as she smoothly mounted him. She thrust gently, panting, and his eyes fluttered open. He let out a soft laugh when he recognized her, and she sighed when she took his full length inside her, leaning forward so she could grind her clit against the base of his cock with each hard thrust. He cupped her breasts, stroking her soft skin reverently, and when she arched, whimpering, her rhythm going rough and desperate, he grasped her hips and forced her down against him, moving restlessly under her, shoving his hips up in short sharp thrusts.

"How," she cried out, and he cupped her face in his hands, arching to push his cock even deeper. "Ned..."

"Nancy," he groaned, shivering under her. "You, oh my God, it was you, it was supposed to be you."

She leaned down, driving her hips harder against his, her breasts crushed against his chest, and he cupped her ass in his hands, pressing himself in deeper. She bit his neck and he wrapped his arms around her, pulling her closer, his lips brushing her cheek.

"Please," she whimpered, and he pushed himself up on his elbows, watching her toss her hair back, sobbing in pleasure as she pulled away, his cock sliding almost entirely out of her, before she drove herself down hard. She fucked him until she was shuddering from the intensity of her orgasm, her entire body jerking with each thrust, and then he pinched her nipple and she screamed, clenching him tight inside her as they came.

They collapsed to the bed together, with her still sprawled on top of him, and he blew a lock of her hair off his lips, still gasping for breath.

"It wasn't like that," he said quietly, as she raked her hair back, shivering.

She looked away from him. Her skin wanted to crawl where it touched his; she pushed herself up quickly, swung away from him, sat on the edge of the bed and found that damn thong.

"Don't call me," she said, pulling her panties back on. "Unless the test comes back negative. Then we'll talk. But I won't be hearing from you," she said, and it wasn't a question.

"Nan," he said, gently touching her back, and she shrank away from him, willing herself not to cry until she was outside his door. She stood up, swiftly hooked her bra and pulled the straps up, began to struggle into her jeans.

"This didn't happen," she said, concentrating on the button of her fly.

The mattress gave a low groan, and then he had grabbed her by the belt loops and was spinning her to face him. "Like hell," he said.

"And what?" she demanded, jerking away from him with such force that one of the loops tore free. She scooped up her shirt, moving out of his armspan. "You're going to tell Denise? And then what?"

He shook his head, his jaw set. "We... this can't be over."

"It was over the day you fucking called me," she said angrily, jerking her shirt over her head, twisting her hair up. "It's all right, Ned. Pretty soon you'll have forgotten it all. Pretty soon you won't feel guilty anymore, not when you see that baby in your arms."

He stood, and she had almost managed to get out of his room when he grabbed her, pinning her against the wall, his grip hard on her forearms this time. "I can't do this without you."

She laughed bitterly. "I think there's ample evidence to the contrary."

He swung her arms up hard and pinned them roughly to the wall over her head, and she stared back at him, unblinking, her own jaw set. "I can't let you just... make it all your own rules."

"You've given up the right," she said softly. "I asked you for this, and you gave it willingly, and now it's over."

He released her and she chafed her reddened skin gently. "Look me in the eye and tell me you don't feel anything for me anymore," he said.

"So what," she answered, jerking away from him, heading for his couch. "I know you'll be special to me, even after what you did. You didn't have to sleep with me tonight."

"If I'd known it was going to end like this, I might've changed my mind," he said, standing in his bedroom doorway with his arms crossed, still completely naked.

"You did know." She slid into her jacket, hooked her purse over her shoulder, then took a few steps toward him. "This is for the best," she said.

He shook his head. "So you feel better about everything now."

Tears started stinging her eyes, so she rubbed at them with the heels of her hands. "I was able to say goodbye to the man I loved," she replied, her voice shaking. "The man who is going to be married to someone else in two weeks. And if you feel anything at all for me, if you still want me to be happy, you'll let me walk out that door, and you won't make me look back at this."

His face went completely still, and she realized he was trying not to cry.

She closed the distance between them and kissed him softly on the cheek, but he made a soft noise and slanted his mouth down hard against hers.

_I'm going to make you my wife one day,_ he had told her.

She sobbed once and pulled away, almost running to his door, some tiny part of her waiting the entire time for him to tell her to stop.

He didn't.

As his door closed behind her she felt her heart break all over again.


End file.
